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Walmart’s had a bunch of gaming PCs on sale for a while now, and over the course of the weekend, it dropped the prices on a whole bunch even more than they already were. Don’t wait for the new RTX 2080 benchmarks if you’re thinking of jumping, head-first, into the world of PC gaming. With these sale prices, you can get a perfectly competent gaming PC right now, one that runs basically every modern game, for around the same price as a new 20-series card alone.

Of course, the parenting hilarity doesn’t stop once children learn how to talk. While spending some time with the couple’s eldest daughter Jasmine Lia, 2, earlier this month, the Skyscraper actor revealed he had gotten a very interesting compliment from the child.

“Great to recharge the batteries this weekend, back home with all my girls and teaching this lil’ tornado how to swim,” the doting dad wrote alongside a photo of himself and his daughter in the pool.

“Took my shirt off and she said, Daddy I like it your brown boobies.. Thank you baby, but daddy has pecs, not boobies,” he wrote, adding the humorous hashtag, “#MrBrownBoobs.”

“I was raised and surrounded by strong, loving women all my life, but after participating in baby Tia’s delivery, it’s hard to express the new level of love, respect and admiration I have for @laurenhashianofficial and all mamas and women out there,” he wrote.

Once ridiculed, ‘dad style’ was all over the runways for spring, but before you dust off those saggy khakis with a triumphant ‘I told you so,’ consider our guide to this tricky trend.WSJ.com: Lifestyle

Apple Inc.’s move to jack up prices on its flagship iPhone helped deliver record quarterly revenue and profit, but the company projected weaker-than-expected sales for the current quarter that adds to questions about the demand for the technology giant’s most important product.WSJ.com: WSJD

Our writers have some radical ideas on how to improve the NHL’s midseason classic, such as turning it into a four-team international tourney, pitting the defending Cup champs against the world, restoring the fantasy draft and reuniting Team North America.www.espn.com – NHL

The NHL All-Star skills competition is crazy fun as it is. But it can always be a little crazier. Here are 10 suggestions, including dodgeball on ice, human bowling and the 100-on-3 challenge.www.espn.com – NHL

”Stranger Things” producer and director Shawn Levy has offered up some hints on the future of the surprise Netflix hit that’s going to be a lot darker in Season 2.

In fact, the new installment of the Duffer brothers’ series “makes the Demogorgon look quaint,” Levy said during a Facebook Live interview Thursday with The Hollywood Reporter.

“I was just in the edit room with the brothers yesterday, and we were like, ‘This is definitely darker. I hope everyone’s down with this.’ Because the threats to Hawkins and to our characters are bigger, darker, oftentimes scarier,” he said.

“So, people who found Season 1 too scary for them, probably you’re going to be more scared by Season 2. But again, the best thing I can tell you is, through it all, it’s got the best heart. But it is ― cinematically and budgetarily ― it’s definitely more ambitious.”

Season 2 kicks off one year after Will Byers (Noah Schnapp) returns from the Upside Down. Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown) is seemingly alive, according to the trailer that aired during the Super Bowl, and some new kind of monster is terrorizing Hawkins, Indiana. Will is also having trouble adjusting back into life after his trauma, along with Nancy (Natalia Dyer) and Mike (Finn Wolfhard).

Levy stressed that although the “Stranger Things” bosses were fascinated by the outpouring of support last summer, they aren’t going to let fans’ wishes come before the creators’ instincts.

“We are going to do things that fans will be disappointed in, but I think they will be more satisfied by,” he said.

Like what?

“People still think Barb’s alive,” Levy explained. “You think you want that! But you wouldn’t really want that,” he said, saying that celebrities have come up to him to ask about the fate of Shannon Purser’s character.

“No, you saw! She had a creature ― a slug-worm-snake ― coming out of her mouth. I don’t know that there’s a bounce-back from that. So, no, we are not going to cravenly service the wish list of fans.”

Season 2 premieres Oct. 31 on Netflix.

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It’s hard to work on a TV show like “The Handmaid’s Tale” and not be “jolted” into a “state of consciousness,” according to Joseph Fiennes.

Fiennes plays Commander Fred Waterford, the leader of the oppressive dystopian republic called Gilead in Hulu’s hit series “The Handmaid’s Tale,” based on the book of the same name by Margaret Atwood. The book has been heralded as a feminist classic and (after some initial back and forth) the show seems to be following suit. So it comes as no surprise that Fiennes says he’s become an even bigger feminist after playing the Commander on a set full of iconic women like Elisabeth Moss (the show’s protagonist Offred) and Yvonne Strahovski (Serena Joy, the Commander’s brilliantly sadistic wife).

In a June 15 interview with Marie Claire, Fiennes said the series has really awoken him to women’s issues ― especially since the “most important people” in his life are his wife and two daughters.

“Certainly the show has jolted me into a much more alert state of the inequality amongst the sexes,” he said. “By virtue of that, I feel much more switched on to feminism, and what it means and stands for. I want my daughters to live in a world where there is equality and parity of pay. We’ve got a long way to go. I read a statistic that if you’re a Hispanic woman it’ll be over 200 years until you achieve parity of pay. So yes, the show has jolted me into a state of consciousness.”

The show has jolted me into a much more alert state of the inequality amongst the sexes. By virtue of that, I feel much more switched on to feminism, and what it means and stands for.Joseph Fiennes

“When you wake up and you see that America has pulled out of the climate deal in Paris, that sends huge messages about putting coal before the planet. Gilead has suffered from a fragile ecology that is now toxic and affecting fertility rates,” Fiennes told Marie Claire. “There is truth to it ― there is connection, themes, and parallels, sadly. It’s getting sharper and sharper, especially for women ― the autonomy of their bodies, and pro-choice vs. pro-life. Look at the administration, the imbalance of the female presence ― there’s a lot to draw on.”

One silver lining? The protests and resistance the U.S. has seen since President Donald Trump took office.

When Paris Hilton isn’t blonde, it feels like our “Simple Life” has been turned upside down.

The 36-year-old reality star debuted her new brunette locks a few days ago in an Instagram that left her fans reeling. It’s unclear if she dyed her hair, or if Hilton is fooling all of us with a very convincing wig.

One unsuspecting woman was wearing her engagement ring for over a year without even realizing it.

How exactly is this possible, you might ask? It all started when an Australian man named Terry made his girlfriend Anna a necklace out of Huon pine ― a wood native to Tasmania ― for their one-year anniversary in 2015. Unbeknownst to Anna, Terry had hidden an engagement ring inside the necklace.

For a year and a half, Anna wore that necklace almost every day without knowing there was anything, let alone an engagement ring, inside.

During a trip to Smoo Cave in northern Scotland in November 2016, Terry was finally ready to pop the question and to reveal the big surprise.

“I picked Smoo Cave because it was a place we had talked about visiting since we first met, and ‘smoo’ comes from an old Norse word for ‘hiding place,’ so I think I get extra points for that one,” Terry told HuffPost.

Just before the proposal, Terry asked Anna for the necklace, telling her he was going to take a nice photo of it propped up on some rocks.

That’s when he grabbed a knife to secretly break a seal he had placed on the piece of jewelry.

He told Anna, “Oh, I forgot to give you your necklace back,” pulled the jewelry from his pocket, got down on one knee and cracked it open while asking her to marry him.

“She stood there with this completely confused and dumbfounded look on her face, and when she finally worked out what had just happened, she yelled, ‘Yes!’ and pounced on me,” he told HuffPost.

“It actually took her a couple of moments to understand that the ring had been in the necklace the entire time since I gave it to her,” he continued. “She flipped out ― ‘Wait, it’s been in there the entire time?! I could have lost it, you f**king idiot!’, which was a hilarious mix of happy and angry.”

The couple is saving up to buy a home and hopes that they will someday be able to host their wedding at the house.

“We are hoping to buy a house with land so we can have the wedding at home with our friends and family, in a very relaxed fashion that we think matches us ― rather than having a gigantic, glamorous wedding, which isn’t like us at all,” Terry said.

We can’t wait to see what fun wedding surprises Terry has up his sleeve.

Listen up, Marvel fans: a LGBTQ character could be joining the smash cinematic superhero universe soon ― and we might have already seen them.

In a video interview with The Guardian, director James Gunn hinted at the possibility of existing Marvel characters identifying as queer. Still, he stopped short of mentioning names or any specifics of those characters.

“There’s a lot of characters in the [Marcel Comics Universe] and very few of them that we’ve delved into what their sexuality is,” Gunn, who helmed both “Guardians of the Galaxy” and “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2,” said in the interview, which can be viewed above. “Whether it’s gay or straight or bisexual, we don’t really know.”

He continued, “So I imagine that there are probably, you know, gay characters in the Marvel universe. We just don’t know who they are yet.”

It isn’t the first time that Gunn has hinted at a possible LGBTQ superhero in the Marvel Universe and specifically in the “Guardians” series. He told the Press Association April 20 that he “would love to be able to” feature a queer protagonist in the Marvel franchise, and quickly clarified, “We might have already done that. I say watch the movie.”

People who want to knoweverything about their pets have a powerful new tool. SureFlap, based in the UK, already makes a line of products connected to pets' implanted microchips. Now it's putting out an app-enabled pet door for cats and small dogs. SEE ALSO: Finally, you can vacuum clean your dog It should be pretty straightforward to start tracking your pet with the ultimate pet surveillance set-up, called the Microchip Pet Door Connect. You install the pet door just like any cat or small doggie door. You plug in the "hub" which connects the door to the internet. Then your cat comes slinking in from the garden and you get a notification on your smartphone. Beyond letting you know when your pet comes and goes, the flap is smart enough to be set to lock or unlock, which you can control from the app. As the site a bit creepily suggests, "create a curfew" for your dog. Or "protect your home," since you can now block out neighborhood cats and strays from coming in. So much power. Like company's already-available cat flap and pet feeder, this new product uses pets' microchips. But if they don't have one implanted, RFID collar tags work, too, and are conveniently sold by the British pet tech company. It's coming out this summer for about $ 200, per theVerge, just in time for tracking Fido's every single move. WATCH: Finally, you can vacuum clean your dog

Oprah is the queen of all queens and among the most magical of black women. This, we know.

But at a press event in New York on Tuesday ― in promotion of her new film “The Immortal Life Of Henrietta Lacks” ― Oprah stepped into a room filled with all black women reporters, myself included, and totally lost her cool. And THAT, we didn’t expect.

“When has this ever happened?” Oprah asked all of the women of color in the room. “This is a story in itself!”

In preparing to be starstruck, the journalists in the room hadn’t considered that a black woman who has broken every glass ceiling would be so taken back by the moment of solidarity. It was a scene that reinforced the power of representation as a group of young black women journalists not only got to meet but interview the woman who helped to pave the way for black female storytellers everywhere.

Oprah praised the feature and referenced Tuesday’s press event and why she wanted to share it live on social media.

“I love the fact that we can connect, like, instantly” Oprah told TMZ. “I’ve never been in a room where there were all these beautiful black women who didn’t know each other who all showed up at a junket from various news organizations. I walked into the room and every single person was an African American woman and it was so damn cool! So I just started using Facebook live right there.”

You can read more about the film and our interview with Oprah here, which goes into detail about why she wanted to bring to light the experiences of another black woman who helped change the world.

Baseball season is in full swing again, and it’s hard to pick out our favorite part. Is it the spring weather, the peanuts, the Cracker Jacks — or the joy of seeing Bill Murray goof around on a minor-league field?

WCIV sports reporter Daren Stoltzfus caught this chummy moment between the comedian and two umpires at a recent Charleston RiverDogs game in South Carolina. Murray, a co-owner of the team, was set to throw out the Opening Day pitch, but not before trying to sway the officials with some cold, hard cash.

Despite billions of dollars in spending cuts and a modest oil-price rebound, Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch Shell, Chevron and BP didn’t make enough money in 2016 to cover their costs, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis.WSJ.com: US Business

The pop star’s her first internationally released album, coincidentally also titled “So Good,” dropped on Friday and has already scored killer reviews, as well as the honor of being the most streamed debut album by a female artist on Spotify with over 1.3 billion streams.

The outspoken Swedish singer joined The Huffington Post Monday to chat about making her new album and how feminism has impacted her work and life, and to offer her thoughts on Donald Trump being president.

“I’m not American, so I can’t speak for the American people but I do have opinions,” Larsson said. “Looking at Trump, every day there’s a new thing that he did and new things that he said and tweeted … and it all just makes me so tired. I’m not even American and it makes me so tired to watch this … It’s just so much.”

She also blitzed her way through a lightning round, with questions ranging from “alcohol or weed?” to her favorite body part on a man and a woman to which female superstar’s concert she’d attend if she found herself with a free night to burn in Las Vegas.

Amazon’s cloud service went offline last week, taking parts of the internet with it. The good news: Amazon has addressed the issue, and is working to ensure nothing similar happens again. Indeed, the incident last week was an aberration that shouldn’t scare you into not trusting AWS anymore, according to two analysts we spoke to.

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Considering the complaints and slams following the delays of his Season 4 show, Kanye West was expected to start his Season Five early — at least, according to the line of attendees gathered outside Pier 59. And a timely start was what he gave the people — even if it meant launching into his collection before Kylie Jenner and Tyga arrived.
The show started promptly at 3:23 p.m., and at 3:28 p.m. Jenner and Tyga were led through the room, having missed the first several looks.
Early to arrive was Hailey Baldwin, awaiting the action.
“I just wanted to support Yeezy, Kanye and Addidas, so I decided to come out for him,” she said. “I don’t really like to sit in shows, but this one for sure. Kanye is always doing something a little unexpected, that I personally really like, that people really respond well to. I think it’s going to be a great collection — it always is.”

Kylie Jenner at Yeezy Season 5

Baldwin continued that “you never know with him. Sometimes he’s either doing [music] or he’s staying super fashion, so it’s hard to say,” she said, before shouting after a friend — “Taco!”
The nearly pitch-black setting made front row greetings challenging, even for the famous faces.

In today’s edition of Obama Relationship Goals, let’s take a look back at the first couple’s 2011 Oprah Show appearance, when then-president Barack Obama reminded all of us about the love and respect at the foundation of a solid marriage.

During the interview, the president and first lady Michelle Obama sat down to talk about their lives, their relationship and their time in the White House. Reflecting on his lead-up to the presidency, President Obama gave due credit to Mrs. Obama, his equal partner in every sense of the word.

“Obviously, I couldn’t have done anything that I’ve done without Michelle,” President Obama said.

The 44th president continued with a response to one of Oprah’s questions earlier in the interview. “You were asking earlier what keeps me sane, what keeps me balanced, what allows me to deal with the pressure. It is this young lady right here and our two daughters,” President Obama said, taking his wife’s hand. “When I come home, no matter what I’m dealing with, I know that I’ve got people there who, not only do I love, but whose company I just enjoy and who will bring me down to a level of basic humanity and humor.”

President Obama then summed up the couple’s relationship in two beautiful sentences.

“Not only has she been a great first lady, but she is just my rock,” he said. “I count on her in so many ways, every single day.”

No parent is immune to the storm of germs and illness that permeates every preschool class … not even championship-winning NBA stars.

On Sunday, Golden State Warriors star, Stephen Curry, missed a game against the Portland Trail Blazers. His reason? He came down with the stomach flu his 4-year-old daughter Riley brought home from school.

In an interview with KGO at the Warriors practice facility on Wednesday, Curry explained what many parents know all too well. “Preschool, I heard that when you start your kids in school, that first year or two you’re pretty much susceptible to any and everything,” he said. “So far, it’s been OK. We just had a little rough go last week.”

Best of luck, Steph!

The HuffPost Parents newsletter offers a daily dose of personal stories, helpful advice and comedic takes on what it’s like to raise kids today. Sign up here.

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Win 10 challenges and become the champion! Kids will be so wrapped up in this Even Steven’s Odd: The Wicked Fast Dice-Rolling Game from Educational Insights that they may not even realize they are doing math! Players draw a card and then compete with each other to roll their dice and be the first to fill their dice holder with the correct combination. From simple challenges (such as rolling all ones or getting a straight in any color) to more complex challenges (like having the total of their three colored dice add up more than the total of their three white dice) this fast paced game is fun for the whole family. The 40 challenge cards range from easy to those requiring more complex thought processes. Includes 24 dice (12 white, 12 colored) and 4 dice holders. For 2-4 players, ages 7 & amp up.

Do you want to host an event so expertly designed that your guests will swear you enlisted the help of a professional event planner? If so, this is the only book for you. In this book, Collin Stover expertly teaches you: How to plan events with more confidence, creativity, and success. How to put “butts in seats” and get people to show up to your event. How to make your birthday party, graduation party, wedding, fundraiser, or business event the best any of your guests will have ever experienced How to avoid being ROBBED by your vendors at the event. And so much more!

This Gwyneth Paltrow-approved treatment involves a tube that blows hot steam onto your vagina that allegedly “balances female hormone levels” (dubious). We’re not so sure about paying upward of $ 50 to give our vaginas steam “facials,” but who are we to judge!

The Lisa Frank obsession this year prompted a clothing line,coloring booksand this mesmerizing, psychedelic trend in hair dye. Rainbow hair isn’t necessarily weird, but the fact that it’s inspired by 90s-era school stationary is a little unusual.

Starting with “polish mountain,” beauty vloggers spent hours of their lives in 2016 demonstrating what 100 layers of mascara, foundation and liquid lipstick look like (to name a few). Jenna Marbles took it about 500 steps further when she did them all, plus hairspray and false lashes, because why not?

A video posted by Abed (@abedallahitani) on Dec 13, 2016 at 9:46am PST

As if we needed another reason to idolize Nutella: it allegedly lightens hair (we are highly skeptical) in addition to being the most delightful snack on the planet. Have we mentioned we’re skeptical? Of course, pretending to use Nutella as a hair dye would be pretty weird too.

Where else could this presidential election go? Is it too extreme to think that one candidate might remove their head to reveal that an alien has been in control the whole time. That would be pretty shocking … BUT WOULD IT REALLY???

We started the hashtag #ElectionPlotTwist because we want to know what’s going to happen!

Has Bruce Willis been dead this whole time? Is it all a dream? Or are we in some kid’s snow globe???

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Some make New Year’s resolutions in January, but in the life of Coco Austin, it’s never too late to set your 2016 goals. She took to Instagram to show a peek of her new CocoLicious Lingerie collection, claiming in 2016 she’s “coming back with a vengeance” (which apparently means using as little fabric as possible in the design process).

Source: Coco Austin/Instagram

The 37-year-old naturally posed in the pieces herself, showing off her post-baby body (she gave birth to Chanel Nicole four months ago) in a red criss-cross neckline bra and high-waisted double-string thong.

The Internet agreed that “Seinfeld” co-creator and “Curb Your Enthusiasm” star Larry David did a pretty, pretty good impression of Democratic presidential candidate (and fellow Brooklyn native) Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on “Saturday Night Live.” Even Sanders himself loved it, joking that he’ll invite David to his campaign rallies because “he does better than I do.”

But here’s one that rivals David’s portrayal, from comedian James Adomian, who performed his own Sanders impression last week at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre in New York.

Watch Adomian as Sanders in the clip above, participating in a “debate” with Donald Trump, played by comedian Anthony Atamanuik.

And here’s David again, in case you missed it.

Also on HuffPost:

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Going back to school after summer can be misérable. But not if you’re a student in West Des Moines, Iowa.

At a welcome-back meeting for the school district’s staff, the superintendent’s speech was cut short by a flash-mob of teachers performing a parody of “One Day More” from Les Misérables.

Including lyrics like “Do we known the common core?” and “Will my lesson be a bore?” the delightful — and extremely well-rehearsed — rendition of the Broadway classic perfectly captures the qualms and trepidations about returning to the classroom after summer vacation.

While these lyrics are on point, so are the performers. Seriously, they’re so good, and according to the video’s YouTube description, only 12 of these raw talents are music teachers.

The video was posted on YouTube on August 23 and has since racked up over 1 million views, as of Thursday.

Students in West Des Moines better be stoked to return to school after seeing this. With these fantastic educators by their side during the school year, they certainly won’t be on their own.

Also on HuffPost:

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“A person who smiles a lot is either a fool or an American.” — Russian adage

The French government has launched a new campaign to make its citizens smile in an effort to promote a more welcoming environment for tourists. But science tells us that French authorities will be beating their heads against the wall if they really think they can coax aloof Parisians to put on a happy face.

Because, well, there’s no smiling in France.

Or so say psychologists from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, who have found that the most expressive nations — those with citizens who are quickest to crack a smile – are those with heavy immigrant populations. That puts the homogeneous France near the bottom of the list with Russia and Japan. Among the leaders: Canada, Brazil and the good ol’ U.S.A.

So, what is it about living in the world’s melting pots that puts smiles on the faces of their citizenry? Simply put, a smile is the mother tongue. It bridges language barriers, predicts trust and signals friendly intentions among people of disparate origin.

And conversely, it is a lack of smiles, among other things, that has given France a reputation for being a difficult place to visit, especially if you don’t speak the language.

This isn’t the first time the French have tried to legislate smiles to convey warmth to tourists. The current effort is similar to campaigns in 2003 and 2009 , when the tourism board set up “smile ambassadors” at the nation’s most-visited spots. But by all accounts, the efforts of the police du sourire fell flat. Those smiles turned – or stayed – upside down.

What Happens to Our Brains When We Smile

There is fascinating research about the power of an upturned mouth. Smiling activates the release of neurotransmitters, including dopamine and serotonin, that help fight off stress. Having too little of these brain chemicals has been linked to depression. When we smile, we also trigger the release of “happy hormones,” including endorphins, the same chemicals that give us that “runner’s high” after exercising. Even aping a smile can spark a feeling of happiness and reduce stress. Charles Darwin was the first to suggest that one’s emotions could be enhanced by one’s expressions, positing that just the act of smiling produces positive emotion.

Fast forward more than 100 years and “positive emotion” leads off renowned positive psychologist Martin Seligman’s five-sided PERMA model of the traits that foster well-being. According to Seligman, there are two kinds of smiles, the “Duchenne smile” and the “Pan American” smile. The Duchenne smile (named for neurologist Guillaume Duchenne) is involuntary and genuine. It is a broad smile that forms wrinkles on the outer edges of the eyes (i.e. crow’s feet). On the other hand, the Pan Am smile (the forced smile of flight attendants from the long-defunct airline), is inauthentic. It involves only the muscles of the mouth. (To see if you can spot the fake from the real smile, take this quiz from the BBC.)

But back to our poker-faced friends around the world: In the UW-Madison study, researchers examined the psychology of smiling in 726 people from nine countries and compared the results for each country with its immigration numbers. Participants were asked what constituted a good reason to smile, with options like, “is a happy man,” “to sell you something,” or “feels inferior to you.”

The results? Countries with more immigration over the last 500 years were more likely to interpret the smile as a happy or friendly gesture.

In countries with less diverse pasts, such as France, Russia and Japan, the act of smiling is more complex. Japanese people will grin to mask negative feelings. The Japanese tend to control their expression of emotion so much so that people there have been given instruction in the art of the smile. Meanwhile, the French are so notorious for not smiling that the British tourism group VisitBritain released a guidebook with tips for U.K. hoteliers to avoid offending guests from other nations. “Don’t exchange a smile or make eye contact with anyone from France who you do not know,” the guidebook states.

But can we equate the act of smiling with true happiness? In a paper called “The French Unhappiness Puzzle,” economist Claudia Senik argues that France’s “cultural mentality” makes the French far less happy than their wealth and lifestyle would predict. Senik’s research suggests that French unhappiness is due in large part to “multi-dimensional” dissatisfaction and a low level of trust in other people. She says policies to address unhappiness in France should start in early childhood.

A smile, real or fake, is a good starting point, and the bigger the grin, the better. Researchers at Wayne State University analyzed the smiles of 230 Major League Baseball players culled from their 1952 trading cards to test how positive emotions affect longevity. The intensity of the players’ smiles was compared with life data for the men, controlling for body mass index, education, career length and other factors. As it turned out, the players with the broadest smiles lived seven years longer.

The Big Picture

The UW-Madison researchers believe there are public policy implications that come with exposure to, and understanding of, diverse cultures living within the same borders. For example, said lead author Paula Niedenthal, citizens “may be more or less willing to pay for universal healthcare, because they empathize differently with in-group and out-group members.”

So let’s hope the French Smile Revolution is a winner this time around. It’ll build trust among tourists and natives alike, and lift moods all around. Personally, I hope the friendly efforts penetrate deeper than a superficial strategy aimed at fiscal gain, because we don’t have to excavate ancient history to see how the smile has been used as a propaganda tool.

Here in the free world, I highly recommend smiling. And go all the way. You can fake it ’til you make it, but the Duchenne smile is a more powerful mood changer than the perfunctory one flashed at the Pan Am jet-setters.

Jason Powers, M.D., is chief medical officer at Promises Austin drug rehabilitation center and The Right Step network of addiction treatment programs in Texas. He is an addiction blogger and the pioneer of Positive Recovery, an approach to addiction treatment that helps people discover meaning and purpose in their lives.

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

GPS for the Soul – The Huffington Post
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We’re only just seeing the trend truly develop at the couture shows taking place in Paris this week. The look was first spotted on Sunday, when Karlie Kloss wore her Atelier Versace finale dress right off the runway and into the AmfAR dinner that followed. From the front, the violet gown with sheer skirt was fairly unassuming by runway standards, then—wham!—she turned to the side to reveal that there was basically no fabric on either side of the bodice.

The second sighting of the side naked dress came at the Dior Haute Couture show, where Raf Simons showed a sleeveless gown with a plunging neckline—completely bare at either side, held together only by two small link chains.

Researchers suggest 300 minutes weekly of activities such as walking or gardeninghealthfinder.gov Daily News
SPECIAL NEWS BULLETIN!-http://www.acrx.org -As millions of Americans strive to deal with the economic downturn,loss of jobs,foreclosures,high cost of gas,and the rising cost of prescription drug cost. Charles Myrick ,the President of American Consultants Rx, announced the re-release of the American Consultants Rx community service project which consist of millions of free discount prescription cards being donated to thousands of not for profits,hospitals,schools,churches,etc. in an effort to assist the uninsured,under insured,and seniors deal with the high cost of prescription drugs.-American Consultants Rx -Pharmacy Discount Network News-
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Eleven-year-old dance phenom Taylor Hatala is back for yet another bout of epic choreography, this time with 12-year-old Kyndall Harris. The girls appear together in an incredible video set to Chicago rapper E-Train’s “Wreck The Discotech” for dance entertainment network DanceOn.

For the past year, self-proclaimed Black American Princess Claudia has been planning her perfect wedding, destined to be the event in Atlanta’s black society. But when her prince gets cold feet, she’s stunned and humiliated. She’s done things in the bedroom with this man that her mother would disown her for! Annelise is frustrated. How long can a woman go without getting some from her husband? The man she supported through law school, who she signed a prenup for. But it seems the man who used to want it all the time is still getting it from another woman. Thank goodness their devotedly single friend Lishelle has a couch to spare. But when The Guy Who Got Away in college reappears in her life, she starts envisioning a walk down the aisle. Ignoring her friends’ advice, she agrees to guarantee his bank loans for a new business. A girl’s got to invest in her future husband, right? But once he gets his hands on her money, he disappears. After a little digging, the women discover that the jerks they’ve trusted have betrayed them in ways they’d never imagined. As the scorned friends bitch over a bottle of wine, an idea begins to take shape-letting these weasels slink quietly out of their lives is too good for them. These women want revenge.

If that declaration from Imperator Furiosa isn’t a ringing endorsement for tampons, we’re not sure what is.

In two parody commercials featuring Furiosa from “Mad Max: Glory Road,” actress and comedian Whitney Rice teamed up with writer and director Doug Hurley to give a glimpse into a world where the ass-kicking warrior has the perfect side gig.

“The inspiration for the video came after watching ‘Mad Max’ and thinking, ‘Huh, I wonder what products will jump on the Mad Max bandwagon?'” Rice told Bustle. “‘Probably feminine products — oh, that would make a hilarious series of commercials.'”

On Wednesday, David Letterman will step down as host of “The Late Show” after 22 years, on top of the 11 seasons he spent at NBC on “Late Night With David Letterman.” He’s a one-of-a-kind talent whose void in the late-night landscape will undoubtedly be felt.

But let’s not get all weepy and teary-eyed just yet. Instead, here are a few of Dave’s best quotes. Some are funny. Some are poignant. And the rest fall somewhere in between, where David Letterman was truly a master.

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SPECIAL NEWS BULLETIN!-http://www.acrx.org -As millions of Americans strive to deal with the economic downturn,loss of jobs,foreclosures,high cost of gas,and the rising cost of prescription drug cost. Charles Myrick ,the President of American Consultants Rx, announced the re-release of the American Consultants Rx community service project which consist of millions of free discount prescription cards being donated to thousands of not for profits,hospitals,schools,churches,etc. in an effort to assist the uninsured,under insured,and seniors deal with the high cost of prescription drugs.-American Consultants Rx -Pharmacy Discount Network News-
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A photo posted by Robbie (@awildrobbieattacks) on Jul 15, 2014 at 2:51am PDT

So why is this such a big deal? OK, first, let’s skip past the fact that in “Harry Potter,” Luna came in during Ginny’s year and is younger than Harry. Just forget that. But didn’t Harry also take Luna to Professor Slughorn’s Christmas party? Now his dad might be taking her out? Oh, and what about Lily Potter, James? What about Lily?

Voldemort has done some pretty messed up things to Harry Potter before, but this might be crossing the line.

That being said, we wish all the happiness in the world to the potential couple because they are just actors and Harry Potter isn’t real. Or that’s what people want you to believe, anyway.

Representatives for the actors did not immediately respond to The Huffington Post’s requests for comment.

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

A wedding will not plan itself with little attention from the bride and/or groom, even if you hire an experienced, professional wedding planner. I’m sorry, but that’s the facts of life. You can find the best planner in the world and pay her a ton of money and give her an unlimited budget (which rarely, if ever, happens), and she can do the vast majority of the planning for you; however, there are some decisions the bride and groom must make.

Some couples reading this must think it sounds crazy that some brides and grooms have so little interest in their own wedding details because they’re up to their necks in every last detail of their own wedding plans. But some engaged couples don’t have time — legitimately — to take on the minutia of dealing with all the decisions, contracts, vendors, etc. They want to hire somebody to do everything for them.

And we can do most of it. While it makes me uncomfortable to choose certain things on behalf of a client whom I’ve never met that lives thousands of miles away, if they tell me it’s my choice and they don’t want to deal with it, it’s my job. With that said, there are five things that brides and grooms MUST do for themselves, even if they have a wedding planner:

1. You must plan your own wedding ceremony. We give our clients a planning guide that’s easier than Mad Libs but some of them still put it off to the very last minute and are surprised they have to do it themselves. I cannot choose the vows a couple will exchange during the wedding ceremony. These are serious promises you’re making before your friends and God (or whatever/whoever you believe in) and you have to decide what you want to say. The “charge to the couple” — basically the instructions for married life — is something else important for the couple to select based on their own beliefs about marriage. The one and only time I was left with absolutely no vows from a groom, the bride and I substituted some Dr. Seuss vows that were hilarious. It worked, but did it really mean anything for their lives together?

2. You have to decide whether you’re taking your spouse’s last name or not, and how you want to be introduced to your guests at the conclusion of the ceremony and when you make your grand entrance at the reception. I can name you if you want me to, but seriously folks, that’s a pretty major thing. If she’s not taking his last name, there can be blowback from older, more traditional guests if we make it obvious so there are ways around that. And with same-sex weddings, it’s even trickier because they have more options. I have to know what you want to be called or I can’t do it properly at your wedding. Neither can the minister.

3. Even if you don’t know anything about flowers, you have to show me a picture of a bridal bouquet you like, and give me some sort of clue about how you want your wedding décor to be planned. There are literally thousands of example pictures on our Facebook, Instagram and other social media pages — look and pick something you like. You can really send me a picture of anything from anywhere and I’ll work with you on that, but telling me that you want it to be “simple” and you “hate pink” does not give me enough information to plan a “dream wedding” you’ll have to look at in pictures for the rest of your married life.

4. Honorees who are being asked to give toasts at your wedding must be selected by the bride and groom, in advance. Otherwise, you’ll have a never-ending, round robin of wasted guests jumping up to grab the microphone and add their two cents about you in front of all your family and friends. After a few cocktails, everyone thinks they’re a comedian. Toasts become roasts. And it can go on forever, burning up precious dance and party time at the reception. Obviously, as the wedding planner, I have no idea who you’d like to have toast and without that information, I have no way to control what will actually go down at your wedding. You should discuss your selections AS A COUPLE and give your wedding planner the exact names of who you’d like to have say a few words. If this is hard for you, stick to tradition and have the best man, maid of honor, parents of the groom and parents of the bride offer toasts, in that order. And of course, the bride and groom should toast and thank their guests when everyone is finished.

5. Your wedding planner cannot choose your wedding music. I will not take responsibility for selecting the songs you will process and recess to at your wedding ceremony. I won’t choose your entrance or first dance song for your reception. If you forget a last dance, I’ll figure something out, but the others are too meaningful for a complete stranger (because that’s really what I am even if you have met with me once in person when you visited the island) to choose them for you. Beware the wedding planner who leaves your blanks in the hands of a bad DJ — you could suddenly hear “Pour Some Sugar on Me” blasting after you cut the cake, or bonafide stripper music during the garter removal and toss. Funny as we think it is, you don’t want “Closing Time” to be your last dance song even if that’s how the staff is feeling when your event finally ends. But if you didn’t take the time to fill out the music request forms (and the “do not play” list) ahead of time, you just never know what you’ll hear playing at your wedding.

Trust me when I say this blog is oversimplified — I have a lot of clients who eventually do want to make decisions they initially put into my hands. And then we have to redo all the work we’ve already done. Be sure that you truly don’t care when you say you “don’t care” or you’re putting everybody through hell planning, and re-planning, your wedding details.

And just for the record, the next time a bride tells me that she “doesn’t care” what her wedding cake looks like or what flavor it is, I’m going for something incredibly weird and whacky just so I can blog about it and prove a point. Maybe chocolate with peanut butter filling, decorated with their names and wedding date spelled out in mini Reese’s cups would be fun? Enough of me being nice and finding them neutral cakes I can decorate with pretty flowers. They said it was up to me, right? I’m going to have some fun with it.

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SPECIAL NEWS BULLETIN!-http://www.acrx.org -As millions of Americans strive to deal with the economic downturn,loss of jobs,foreclosures,high cost of gas,and the rising cost of prescription drug cost. Charles Myrick ,the President of American Consultants Rx, announced the re-release of the American Consultants Rx community service project which consist of millions of free discount prescription cards being donated to thousands of not for profits,hospitals,schools,churches,etc. in an effort to assist the uninsured,under insured,and seniors deal with the high cost of prescription drugs.-American Consultants Rx -Pharmacy Discount Network News-
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Kim Kardashian is no longer a peroxide blonde. She’s now rocking an even lighter, whiter hair color after reportedly spending three hours in a Paris salon.Entertainment – The Huffington Post
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Six weeks in, Empire's ratings rose again last night, which never happens on TV these days. It seems like everyone's watching the show and for good reason—mainly anything and everything to do with Cookie, from…

Although you watch it every year, what do you really know about the Super Bowl?

This Sunday, the New England Patriots and the Seattle Seahawks are facing off in Super Bowl XLIX. The Super Bowl has a long history of memorable moments, and, with Marshawn Lynch’s Skittles and the Patriots (maybe) deflated balls alone, even more memorable moments are certainly bound to happen this weekend.

But before everything goes down this time around, here are eight things you can learn about the game and share at your viewing party … even if your favorite part is actually the commercials.

1. Someone has snuck into over 30 Super Bowls including the very first championship.

Dion Rich has gate-crashed many, many big events including the Oscars and Olympics, but he has snuck into the Super Bowl the most. In a 1993 Los Angeles Times profile, Rich explained his motives, “It was my hobby. The guys at home expected me to be on the tube or in the papers every year. I couldn’t let them down. I made it on TV or in some publication in 21 of the first 22 Super Bowls.” In the photo above, you can see rich even hoisting Dallas Cowboys coach Tom Landry after they won Super Bowl XII.

Unfortunately, security knows his face these days, checkpoints have increased since 2001, and Rich is no longer able to crash the Super Bowl. According to NY Daily News, his last successful attempt was the New Orleans Super Bowl XXXVI in 2002. Even in the ’90s, Rich told the Los Angeles Times:

After so many years it gets to be a real job. People see me on the sidelines all the time and think it’s easy. It’s not easy, it takes a lot of conniving and ingenuity and contacts. Every year they made it tougher … It just wasn’t that much fun anymore.

2. The first person to say, “I’m going to Disney World!” really didn’t want to do it at first.

USA Today’s For The Win caught up with former Giants quarterback Phil Simms in 2014 to talk about how this first Disney plug came together. Perhaps surprisingly, Simms didn’t have much interest in being a part of the campaign: “I didn’t want to do it,” he said. “I just thought that was wrong trying to do something like that.”

Simms was named MVP of Super Bowl XXI in 1987 and he remembered just being happy about winning the game when the cameras caught him to do the commercial. “Of course I’m smiling because we won, and the other reason is because I can’t believe I’m doing this,” Simms told For The Win.

For his role in the commercial, Simms was paid $ 50,000 and Disney did in fact send his family to Disney World.

In 2008, SF Gate profiled Mark Allan, the camera person who typically rushes on to the field to get the line from the Super Bowl winner, including the first one with Simms. Apparently the person in the commercial has to repeat the line a few times and says both Disney Land and World so the commercial can be targeted to each coast. While trying to capture the players, Simms basically just keeps saying, “Look in the lens.”

3. Joe Montana once calmed his team down before a Super Bowl-winning drive by pointing to the stands and joking, “Isn’t that John Candy?”

It was the 1989 Super Bowl and Joe Montana’s San Francisco 49ers were trailing the Cincinnati Bengals with time running out. According to legend, the 49ers offense were understandably nervous as they had to trek down almost the entire field to score. As Rolling Stone recounted, Montana apparently knew the right words to say to his team to calm their nerves. In a huddle, Montana began pointing to the crowd, saying, “There, in the stands, standing near the exit ramp … Isn’t that John Candy?”

It hasn’t been confirmed whether John Candy was truly in the stands during that game, but, in any case, Montana led the offense 92 yards down the field to score a winning touchdown with just 34 seconds left on the clock.

4. Both “Little Giants” and “Space Jam” were created out of successful Super Bowl commercials.

Ad people Jim Ferguson and Bob Shallcross created a McDonald’s advertisement for the 1992 Super Bowl about pee wee football that ended up catching legendary director Steven Spielberg’s attention. In a 1994 Baltimore Sun article, it was said that Ferguson came into the office one day and was simply told to give Spielberg a call. Ferguson thought it was a practical joke at first, but ended up getting Spielberg on the line. Spielberg apparently said, “I want that commercial made into a movie. I want my ‘Home Alone.'”

In 1994, Ferguson also told the Chicago Tribune, “Ninety seconds and Steven Spielberg changed our lives,” referring to himself and his partner Shallcross. Both of them ended up working with Spielberg to develop “Little Giants.”

The Nike and MCI commercial “Hare Jordan” was another Super Bowl commercial that led to a movie. At the end of “Hare Jordan,” Bugs Bunny tells Michael Jordan, “This could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship!” This obviously ended up being the case as the two were together again for the movie “Space Jam.”

5. During the first Super Bowl, NBC accidentally missed the taping of a kickoff and so the whole play was reset for the cameras.

During Super Bowl I, in 1967, both NBC and CBS had television rights to the game since NBC had a deal with the AFL and CBS the NFL. The game was between the Green Bay Packers and the Kansas City Chiefs and would have to be partially reset at one point due to a screw up by NBC.

As Rolling Stone recounted, the problem happened when the game was coming back from half time and NBC was still televising an interview with comedian Bob Hope. NBC failed to switch to the game fast enough so it was decided that the kickoff Green Bay had just completed would be entirely redone.

Green Bay would end up winning the game and as mentioned before, Dion Rich’s gate crashing ways enabled him to see it all go down.

6. A star player missed the Super Bowl due to a cocaine binge the night before.

The previously mentioned 1989 Super Bowl, in which Joe Montana apparently spotted John Candy in the crowd, had another notable aspect to it. Montana might not have even gotten the chance to make a comeback though if the Cincinnati Bengals offense had had all their players to begin with.

Stanley Wilson was a running back for the Bengals who had already had two strikes from the league for drug use. He had made it through this preceding season without a problem, getting tested multiple times a week. This self control unfortunately only lasted until the night before the Super Bowl as Wilson succumbed to what Rolling Stone described as a “crack-cocaine binge.”

A Cincinnati Enquirer article from 1999 looked into the night surrounding Wilson’s decision and detailed how it almost didn’t even happen. Wilson,on his way to a team meeting with other players, stopped and said, “I forgot my playbook. I’ll meet you guys downstairs.” Wilson headed back to the room and didn’t return.

As this was Wilson’s third strike, he was given a lifetime ban from playing in the NFL.

7. The Baltimore Ravens ended up winning the Super Bowl after referring to the game as “Festivus” the whole season instead.

Festivus might be for the rest of us, but, in 2001, the “Seinfeld”-created holiday was especially for the Baltimore Ravens.

As the book Festivus: The Holiday for the Rest of Us details, the superstitious head coach of the Ravens, Brian Billick, forbade his team from referencing the Super Bowl and playoffs throughout that season. Since logistically this became a problem, offensive lineman Edwin Multialo proposed calling the big game “Festivus Maximus” instead. The term stuck and then the Ravens went on to win “Festivus Maximus” in what was probably one of the biggest celebrations of the holiday yet.

These referee rings aren’t quite the same as the rings that players get, but they’re certainly still a point of pride. Mike Pereira of Fox Sports explained in a 2014 article:

The Super Bowl ring. The officials get Super Bowl rings just like the players do. They aren’t as big as the players’ rings, but they are still valuable pieces of jewelry. These rings mean the world to the officials and they wear them with such pride.

The American Profile also wrote about Super Bowl referees in 2012 and had retired NFL referee Jim Tunney show them his three Super Bowl rings. Referee Gerald Austin was quoted in that article as saying these refs aren’t given much advance notice they’ll be officiating the Super Bowl. “They called me about 11 days before the Super Bowl XXIV,” said Austin.

BONUS: According to legend, the Super Bowl got its name from the “Super Ball” toy.

The Pro Football Hall of Fame has had a super ball (shown in the photo above) on display to commemorate Kansas City Chiefs owner Lamar Hunt’s apparent coining of the game name after his children’s toy. According to Henry D. Fetter of The Atlantic, when Fetter was asked how he originally came up with the name, he said, “My own feeling is that it probably registered in my head because my daughter Sharron and my son Lamar Jr. had a children’s toy called a Super Ball and I probably interchanged the phonetics of “bowl” and “ball.”

But Fetter doesn’t believe that Hunt actually came up with the name. Going by Hunt’s account, by the time he said “Super Bowl,” the term was already starting to take off in newspapers to refer to the previously unnamed championship game. Fetter believes that there is no clear person to point to as the origin and instead the name was sort of collectively decided.

For what it’s worth, according to the Chiefs media page, Hunt is also credited with coming up using Roman numerals in the name and putting Coach Vince Lombardi’s name on the trophy.

As the owner of the online vintage clothing shop Rococo Vintage, I have been working closely with vintage and antique garments for quite some years now. Even before founding my own shop, I spent the bulk of my teen years scouring thrift and vintage stores for treasures, and then the end of my teen years as the assistant to a now very successful LA-based vintage clothing seller.

I was raised in a Victorian house in New England, surrounded by antique furniture and skeleton keys and ancient table linens, and I suppose all that early exposure to, well, “a whole lot of old stuff,” left an imprint on my heart and my mind. I love the character of vintage clothing, the specialness, the whimsy. Unfortunately, many people just see the garments — no matter how valuable or glorious — as nothing more than “old used clothes.” Here are five reasons that just simply isn’t so.

Me, wearing some “old stuff” while getting ready for a vintage show.
(fyi, this is basically the vintage gal’s version of a bathroom selfie.)

1. The quality. The quality of vintage clothing is simply unmatched by that of contemporary clothing, with the exception only of today’s highest end luxury designers. Before the 1970’s when polyester first became king, and especially before the early 1960’s, clothing was constructed to last. The end game with fashion was quality over quantity, for reasons both financial and cultural, and it is not uncommon to find luxurious details like French seams, generous hems, and exquisitely crafted buttons on even the most basic of older vintage garments. These days, even dresses that cost hundreds of dollars boast barely a millimeter of extra fabric, and a quick look at the interior of these garments reveals that regardless of the quality of the design, they were constructed with heightened attention paid to saving the manufacturer money. These days clothing is cheaper to make but not always cheaper to own, and it is only by wearing vintage that a person has the chance to experience true luxury construction (think, Chanel) at a less-than-luxury price. There is nothing as flattering as an artfully crafted garment. Plus, all that extra fabric on the inside of vintage clothing means that it is much easier to have it tailored to fit you perfectly. How great is that?!

Dresses from the 1930’s, 1920’s, and 1950’s, respectively. Look at those details!
They just don’t make ’em like they used to.

2. The uniqueness. When you invest in a vintage garment, you can rest assured that you will never walk into a room to find another person wearing the same thing you are (except by the greatest-ever case of vintage-lightning striking twice.) The most special vintage is entirely unique and bursting with whimsical details that cannot be accurately reproduced; the prints, the pintucks, the buttons… there just isn’t anything like them. This is a big part of the reason why so many celebrities have become such big fans of vintage clothing, as they know that they will easily stand out from everyone else on the red carpet with no concern of winding up in a “Who Wore it Best” column. There is something to be said for owning and wearing something that just about nobody else in all the world owns or can wear (and in the case of custom-made vintage garments, of which there are many, absolutely nobody else in the world does or can.) Every garment is a treasure!

Taylor Swift, who is a big fan of vintage clothing,
wearing a vintage 1950’s dress from Rococo Vintage.

3. The stories you hear. Whether or not you are able to discover it, every vintage garment comes with a story. Little is more exciting than being able to trace the origin of a garment — known as the “provenance” — and to be able to conjure up wonderful images of its past life. Even in cases when you cannot find any details beyond where you yourself came across a piece, it takes only a drop of imagination to create those special stories yourself. Vintage and antique clothing is seeped in mystery and history, and learning or dreaming it is half the charm of wearing it. Of course, this is one of the things that some non-vintage-fans object to, as I suppose it takes a certain kind of person to want to think about who wore something before you did, but if you already do or can learn to love it, I cannot tell you how much excitement it brings to simply getting dressed in the morning. It’s rather like having a bunch of wonderful imaginary friends hanging out in your closet!

Who was this young woman? Was this her favorite dress? Did she meet her soulmate while wearing it? Was she a painter? A poet? A professional wartime code breaker? These are the kinds of questions you find yourself asking and wondering about (and loving to ask and wonder about!) when you wear vintage clothing. Photo of unknown girl, c. 1940’s.

4. The people you meet. With absolutely no intention of patting my own back (I swear!) vintage sellers are some of the most fascinating people I have ever met. Whether they own vintage shops, sell at flea markets, or are selling their own or a relative’s old wardrobes, they are people with a great love and respect for what they are doing. It takes a special kind of non-historian historian to be a part of the “vintage world,” and the perspective of vintage sellers is often an entirely unique one. In addition to the sellers themselves, when you wear vintage you find yourself making friends just about everywhere you go. Anytime I wear a vintage or antique piece, I find myself being stopped on the street or approached in line at coffee shops by someone wanting to inquire about what I’m wearing. I’ve even made friends this way! There is certainly something (or a lot) to be said for having the freedom to wander about in jeans and T-shirts or yoga pants and sweatshirts when you want to, but there is also something very special about dressing in a way that reaches out to others without your having to say a word. Vintage clothing is wonderfully nostalgic and invites meaningful conversation in ways that modern clothing just doesn’t.

With my good friend Rodellee Bas of AdoredVintage, who is one of many friends I’ve made thanks to a mutual love of vintage clothing.

5. The clothing has a soul. Vintage clothing is more than just “old used clothes.” It is more than new unworn clothes. It is history, and art, and the stories of those who have come before us. Owning and wearing vintage clothing is a way of keeping those people and those histories and that artistry alive. At the end of the day, to wear vintage clothing is to be wrapped in romance. Vintage clothing is simply special. It just is.

There’s no doubt about it, having your pet in your wedding is super cute. But it’s not always practical, especially if your venue won’t allow it, you’re having a destination wedding or if Fido’s security dog instinct won’t mix well in a crowd of guests. Even if your pet can’t attend the wedding, they can still play a special role in your wedding day. From photobooth prop cardboard cutouts to custom pet cufflinks and even desserts in the shape of your pet, see some of our favorite creative ways you can include your pet in your wedding day below.

“Gigi worked so hard to get the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show, and she didn’t get it. But you know what? That’s just life. She was sad,” Yolanda told Lauren. “She was boxing at Gotham gym every day and in great shape, and it seemed like a perfect fit. But you know what? It ended up not to be. And rather than go, ‘Oh, I’m so sorry,’ I said, ‘Hey, Gigi, that’s life, baby. We’re not always going to get what we want, and this is not a rejection of you, Gigi, as a human being. This is just redirection for you into something that’s going to be much bigger.’ She looked at me like, ‘What do you mean?’ And I go, ‘If it’s meant to be, it’ll happen at another time. It wasn’t meant to happen today.'”

So, firstly, I adore Yolanda and think she lives every inch of her life with so much grace—this whole exchange is parenting 101 if you ask me. Beyond that, I love how real-girl Gigi’s response to not getting the show was. She was bummed, pure and simple, but didn’t throw any diva moves or get angry. Instead of a spoiled celebrity response, she reminded me of myself and all my girlfriends who have had an experience of not getting a job, acceptance letter, or role in the ballet production (OK, that’s personal).

Are you as impressed by Gigi’s low-key response as I am? Can you remember not getting something you really wanted?

No, it’s not the presents. It’s all the little things — sweet, goofy, endearing — that make me feel so happy I chose this particular dude to be my partner in doing this whole life and love thing. So here, in no particular order, are the top 10 things that make me love spending the holidays with my husband:

1. He always wants to buy the loneliest Christmas tree on the lot.
Yes, we have a tiny house that is already way too full with three dogs, two kids, a lizard and the messes he and I are really good at making. But that’s not why he always tries to buy the littlest, saddest, most pathetic Christmas tree on the lot. It’s that he likes that tree. He likes the ones with the gaping holes on one side, or only about 10 total branches. This is part of my husband being one of the sweetest guys you’ll ever meet. It’s very Charlie Brown. I guess that makes me Snoopy, but I think that fits.

2. Late-night sales at the toy store make for really fun dates.
My husband loves to shop. More than I do, if we’re being honest. The last few years we’ve taken the opportunity of a big sale that starts at 9:00 p.m. at a big toy store near us to have my mom stay with our sleeping kids so we can go out alone together to be swarmed by other parents and grandparents frantically vying for the newest Lego or Littlest Pet Shop toy.

Sounds awful, I know, but that one day of the year we don’t mind. It’s exciting. We’re in it together. We WILL find that Playmobil pirate ship and we WILL prevail. Then we get tea lattes at Starbucks and drive home thinking about how fun Christmas morning will be.

3. Dressing up for holiday parties.
My daily attire consists of jeans and tee shirts with either boots or flip flops (depending on the time of year) and that pretty much never changes. But when it comes to going to our friends’ holiday parties, I love to shock people by wearing a fancy dress, heels and a face full of make-up.

Similarly, Ivan is a board shorts and tee shirt guy when he’s not at work, so when we show up and he’s in a suit and tie and I’m all fancy, it’s fun to surprise everyone together. And I like showing off my handsome guy.

4. Watching Arthur Christmas with the kids.
If you haven’t seen Arthur Christmas, an incredible animated feature about three generations of men in the Santa Claus family battling it out to become the most important Santa in history, you need to do yourself a favor and watch it immediately. It’s charming, fun, well-written, well-voiced and has awesome details like elves that deliver each present with high-tech gadgets and gears, like they’re out of Mission Impossible. In many ways, it’s a total guy movie, but I promise you’ll tear up (in a good way) at the end.

It’s one of those animated films that our kids have liked for a few years running, even as they get older, and we enjoy it as much as they do.

5. Watching Scrooged without the kids.
This late-80s horror movie-inspired holiday tale is awesome. This year I tried to watch it with the kids because they are getting older and I thought they could handle it.

They could not.

It is terrifying, but I forget that every year because it’s so heartwarming and really happy — and it’s about Christmas.

One thing Ivan and I have always had in common is our love for great TV and movies. So snuggling in bed and watching Scrooged is total bliss for us. Another good holiday movie to watch together is Love Actually.

6. Sneaking around to find the specific weird thing he wants but doesn’t know I know he wants.
That was a confusing sentence, but what I mean is this: There’s always something he wants, maybe he mentions it off-hand or tells his brother, and he doesn’t know I’m paying attention. Then I go on a hunt to find it. Last year I drove 40 miles to get him a pair of bike shoes for his mountain bike. This year… well, you’ll just have to stay tuned… but the hunt is what makes Christmas special.

7. Knowing that he’d rather be inside on the couch with me than getting drunk on New Year’s Eve.
I’m not judging what anyone else does on New Year’s Eve (as long as you’re not driving or being reckless), but I love keeping it mellow, and I’m so glad Ivan feels the same way. Dinner with friends who also have kids, watching the East Coast ball drop at 9:00 p.m., and then snuggling up on the couch alone after the kids go to bed to read or watch TV is my New Year’s dream.

8. Shooting down his intense need to buy more, more, more, and more presents for the kids.
On December 23rd, we assess what we’ve collected for the kids to make sure they’re balanced and every year Ivan declares that it’s just not enough and goes on a campaign to buy even more presents.

This can be annoying, but it’s part of who he is. He’s intensely generous as a person. Combine that with the fact that the man loves to shop, and you have a combustible situation of excess present-buying!

So every year, like clockwork, Ivan says, “I think we need more” and I say, “I think what we have is fine” and then he usually buys more, but not as many as he would have if left to his own devices.

9. Playing Santa after the kids go to bed on Christmas Eve.
What’s more special than sneaking around wrapping gifts, stuffing stockings and hanging candy canes on the tree? Nothing. It’s one of the greatest gifts that comes with being a parent, if you’re from a family that celebrates Christmas, and it doesn’t last forever. Kids are only little for a short window of time, so you know you’re part of something sacred and rare when it’s happening. On top of that, we always do a lot of cooking for Christmas Eve dinner, and there’s always a lot of good food to nibble at while we prepare.

10. Christmas Day hike or bike ride.
Our family tradition is to make everyone leave their chocolate comas and piles of toys and go for a Christmas Day hike or bike ride. The reason this makes me even more crazy about my husband is that not everyone would go along with these types of shenanigans on a major holiday, but this is the sort of thing we love. Our hot dates alone are usually on our mountain bikes or in the ocean, so it makes sense that on the best day of the year for our family, we’d all be outside.

It’s amazing how much you grow with someone you’re with for a long time. When we first met, our weird traditions and cultural histories collided. We didn’t know how much money to spend, things felt unbalanced, or one side of the family felt neglected. At times we both tried to appease one another and ended up resentful. Holidays can be really tough for couples, and we are no exception. But over time, with compromise and friendship, we’ve evolved a set of holiday traditions that feel uniquely “us” and that remind us how lucky we are to have one another.

Female actors in Hollywood are earning less than their male counterparts. On Friday, The Daily Beast released information from the Sony hack which reveals that Jennifer Lawrence received a smaller portion of the back-end compensation for “American Hustle” than her male co-stars, Bradley Cooper, Christian Bale and Jeremy Renner.

But according to a recent graphic released by The Washington Post (via the New York Film Academy), Lawrence is not alone. In the year 2013, the 10 highest earning male actors earned between $ 32 million and $ 75 million dollars, while the 10 highest earning female actors earned between $ 11 million and $ 33 million.

The Washington Post also notes that the charts points to other forms of discrimination faced by women in Hollywood:

The chart also suggests that age is a bigger factor for female actresses: Their median age is 34.8, while the median age for male actors is 46.5 … Part of the pay gap is undoubtedly due to women’s lower representation overall: Less than a third of speaking characters in the top 500 films between 2007 and 2012 were women, and only 10.7 percent of movies featured a balanced cast where half of the characters were female.

Earlier this month, leaked data also revealed a gender gap among Sony executives: of the 17 employees at the company who earn $ 1 million or more per year, only one is a woman.

Leonardo da Vinci may have been called a genius, but that doesn’t mean he never second-guessed himself.

In a new book, optical engineer Pascal Cotte explains how a new imaging technology known as the layer amplification method (LAM) helped show that Leonardo painted two previous versions of his “Lady with an Ermine” masterpiece before settling on the version that we know today. One version of the 15th Century artwork didn’t even include the ermine at all.

“We’ve discovered that Leonardo is always changing his mind,” Cotte, CTO of the Lumiere Technology company in Paris, told BBC News. “This is someone who hesitates — he erases things, he adds things, he changes his mind again and again… The LAM technique gives us the capability to peel the painting like an onion, removing the surface to see what’s happening inside and behind the different layers of paint.”

“It tells us a lot more about the way Leonardo’s mind worked when he was doing a painting,” Martin Kemp, emeritus professor of the history of art at the University of Oxford, told BBC News. “We know that he fiddled around a good deal at the beginning, but now we know that he kept fiddling around all the time and it helps explain why he had so much difficulty finishing paintings.”

As for the woman depicted in the painting, experts have long believed it to be Cecilia Gallerani, who was the mistress of Ludovico Sforza, the Duke of Milan. According to the Wall Street Journal, just before this portrait was painted, Sforza was awarded the insignia of the Order of the Ermine by the King of Naples, becoming known as “l’Ermellino.” Scholars believe the ermine symbolizes the Duke, or serves as a visual pun on Cecilia’s surname (ermine in Greek is galay.)

Tune in for Gary’s advice on the new series Help Desk on Sunday, September 21, at noon ET/PT.
SUBSCRIBE: http://bit.ly/1vqD1PN

Keith, an economics student, is about to start his career. Like many new grads, he’s nervous about entering the working world and worried about choosing the right job.

“How can I understand myself or better understand my soul to know if this job or career is worth pursuing, and if it will make me happy?” Keith says.

For guidance, he’s turning to Gary Zukav, the internationally renowned teacher and author of The Seat of the Soul. In the above video, Gary explains why even the most delightful job is not enough to fulfill Keith completely, and shows him where to find true happiness.

The ALS ice bucket challenge has taken the world by storm as people have dumped buckets of ice over their heads for an important cause. (To date it has raised more than $ 100 million for the ALS Association.) Most recently though, the challenge has caught on with some adorable members of another species.

Watch these hilarious (and dog-safe!) spins below — perhaps you’ll even be inspired to get your own furry friend involved.

We love this for two reasons: 1. Ammo the dachshund has a shower cap on. A SHOWER CAP! 2. The owner uses warm water on Ammo, making the challenge completely dog-safe, and a whole lot more pleasant.

An ice bucket challenge in which doggie treats come out of the bucket? No wonder these pooches were completely thrilled to be “splashed!”

Ya know, just another heroic day in the life of this police pooch.

By now, you’re probably familiar with ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s disease, because of this viral challenge, but did you know that dogs can be affected by a similar condition?

Degenerative myelopathy (DM) affects canines in a similar way ALS affects humans. DM is a progressive spinal-cord disorder that starts out causing weakness in the hind legs, and may eventually lead to paralysis of the dog’s entire back end within six months to a year, according to the GA Veterinary Rehabilitation, Fitness & Pain Management clinic. There is currently no cure for DM.

Pedro Pascal isn’t that different from most “Game of Thrones” viewers — he wishes his character, the charismatic Oberyn Martell, was still on the HBO show.

Pascal was at San Diego Comic-Con on Thursday, July 24, to launch a new “Game of Thrones” beer from Brewery Ommegang. After a packed audience watched Pascal tap the first keg of the amber-brown Valar Morghulis beer, the actor talked to HuffPost TV about missing his “Game of Thrones” role, and dealing with people who want to squeeze his head.

HuffPost TV: How many of the people who walk up to you and want to say hello also want to squeeze your head?

Pedro Pascal: Like, they want to puncture my eyeballs? A lot of them. I would say more than half of the people who want to get a picture. I always feel a little guilty when I say, “How about I just smile?” Because I don’t want to have to re-create the moment over and over again.

Yeah, that’s a little troubling. You don’t want to have to go to that place again and again.

Yeah, I don’t want to have to re-live the trauma.

Would you rather still be on “Game of Thrones,” or would you rather have the impact that you had, as the character and the way he left?

I think that ultimately, selfishly, I would want to still be on “Game of Thrones,” only because they are the greatest people I’ve ever worked with. Ninety percent of the work is taken care of by the writing — more than that. Ninety-nine percent is taken care of by writing that is that good, and that’s not something that I’m used to. On top of that, it’s the best crew, the best design team and the greatest cast I’ve ever worked with. I had such a good time, and I’ve never been so challenged. Even if my part would shrink to a fraction of what it was, to get to be there and be around everybody and hang out, it’s probably what I would opt for.

I think I’m just going to guilt [executive producers] David [Benioff] and Dan [Weiss]. I’m just going to describe my depression to the point that they’re like, “All right! Ellaria is going to have a dream!” [laughs]

Is it your favorite role?

It’s the best role I’ve ever played on screen, without question.

You said it was challenging — what was the biggest challenge of playing Oberyn Martell?

I would say that the character had a confidence that was really important to portray. Any human being would have trouble feeling that level of confidence — a dangerous sort of confidence, you know? He sort of owns his overconfidence — with major consequences, as you could see. And then physically, it was a very challenging role.

Also, I was very aware of the series, as millions are. I was a big fan of the show, and it was the first time I was ever asked to be part of something I was so hyperaware of as an audience member. So there was a lot to battle internally there. But David and Dan made it so easy.

Even though you were aware of the show, were you prepared for the fandom and events like this and how the fans have been to you?

I think the best thing to do is to play stupid. [laughs] It’s all so exciting and you always want to be careful with your expectations and whether they’re negative or positive. So I just sort of played dumb and had a job to do, which was so easy to do — they loved the character so much, and that was on my side from the beginning. The writers and the directors, they loved on the character so hard. So there was that easy focus, and then it was not up to me in terms of how it would be received.

This cat chowing down on corn is making us so excited for July Fourth BBQs.

The kitten clearly loves corn on the cob and can’t help but verbalize the delicious experience of eating it. Listen to the hungry kitty saying what sounds like, “Yum!” But don’t even bother asking to share, silly human.

GPS for the Soul – The Huffington Post
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There’s nothing quite like a vintage movie poster, but these beauties from Japan raise the bar. We first spotted them on the tumblr 50 Watts (itself a thing of beauty), and we’re reposting them here courtesy Heritage Auctions, where they were found.

Spanning from the 1930s to the 1970s, the posters advertise imported movies — like “Fantastic Voyage,” “Play It Again Sam,” “A Fistful Of Dollars,” and “The Birds.” There are also some domestic creations further down, including a poster for the 1970 film Dodes’ka-den (Clackety Clack), designed by Akira Kurosawa himself.

We were expecting to see chic editors in high heels wading through all the disgusting New York City slush today… but we should have known better. Day 1 of NYFW is about to end and we’ve been following our favorite Instagram accounts, waiting to see a pair of Manolos ruined, but obviously, the fashion crowd came prepared.

Regardless of the melted snow, there has been nothing but glitz and glam and Ladureé macarons on our feeds today. If you were bundled up in the office, check out everything you missed.

It’s only the beginning, but we’re still expecting some royal appearances: